Review

Author(s): Muhsin Mahdi

Review by: Muhsin Mahdi
Source: Journal of Near Eastern Studies, Vol. 23, No. 3 (Jul., 1964), p. 216
Published by: University of Chicago Press
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/543382
Accessed: 08-01-2016 21:15 UTC

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OFNEAREASTERN
JOURNAL
STUDIES

216

represent the result of decades of painstaking scholarship.

Most readers, however, will continue to
admire Professor Baron's relaxed prose,
contagious enthusiasm, and the ease with
which he synthesizes the labor of so many
"spice mixers, cooks, and bakers" who have
served medieval Jewish culture, "in order to
show to the peoples and princes her beauty,
for she is very fair to look on" (cf. VIII, 135).
MUHSINMAHIDI
Universityof Chicago

A New Arabic Grammar of the Written

Language. By J. A. HAYWOODand H. M.
NAHMAD. London: Percy Lund, Humphries & Co. Ltd., 1962. Pp. ix + 687.
45s. net.
The new Arabic grammar by Haywood and
Nahmad is intended to replace Rev. G. W.
Thatcher's Arabic Grammar. "It retains all
that is still valid in the old work, but recasts
the rest to suit modern requirements and the
background of the average modern student"
(p. v). The fresh and clear Arabic font will be
welcomed by the students who had to struggle
through the half-legible photographic reprints
of the older work; the basic vocabulary of
about 4,000 words is selected from both
classical and modern texts; and the extracts
in the "Supplement" are useful and interesting. Like its model, the new grammar is
rather personal in its approach and makes no
claim to being philologically and linguistically precise or thorough. This may have
resulted from the attempt "to explain
grammatical rules in clear and simple
language" (ibid.). But there are serious
disadvantages that will have to be coped
with before this grammar could enjoy the
wide use that it deserves. For instance, the
authors devote several pages to explain
the admittedly complicated rules for writing
the hamza (pp. 10-11, 114-16, 199 ff., 206 ff.,
251 ff.) with limited success, when better
results could be achieved through a syste-

matic account that would require little more

than one page (see Ziadeh and Winder, An
Introduction to Modern Arabic [reviewed in
JNES, XVIII (1959), 167-68], pp. 14-15).
Most of the book, but especially the chapters
on the morphology of verbs, would have
benefited from an account of a few elementary phonetic rules. And apart from
correcting the large number of misprints in
the Arabic font, the Arabic word forms and
sentences in the text and the exercises would
certainly benefit from a thorough check by
a philologist who could cleanse it from
vernacular Arabic and especially from artificial Arabic, that is, word forms and
expressions that originate in grammatical
imagination and the habits of other tongues.
MUHSINMAHDT
Universityof Chicago

An Elementary Classical Arabic Reader. By

M.

C. LYONS. New

York:

Cambridge

University Press, 1962. Pp. viii + 237.

This collection of relatively short extracts
from premodern Arabic texts is intended as a
first reader in classical Arabic. The author
provides a full glossary (pp. 78-221) and
some notes (pp. 222-37). There are numerous
printing errors, especially in the vowel signs
and diacritical points, which mar an otherwise carefully edited text; and some of the
notes (e.g., selection 3, n. 12, selection 4, n. 5)
deserve to be reconsidered.
Thornton and Nicholson's Elementary
Arabic reading books have been out of print
for some time. It is hoped that the author and
the Cambridge University Press will be
encouraged by the success of this very useful
volume to edit and publish more advanced
readers with longer selections and fuller
philological notes. In the meantime, every
effort should be made to reprint the older
series.
MunsIN MAHDI

Universityof Chicago

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